Notes

Social Studies and ELA Frontier Project

Frontier - Thomas Edison

1. One of the most famous and prolific inventors of all time, Thomas Alva Edison exerted a tremendous influence on modern life, contributing inventions such as the incandescent light bulb, the phonograph, and the motion picture camera, as well as improving the telegraph and telephone. Aside from being an inventor, Edison also managed to become a successful manufacturer and businessman, marketing his inventions to the public.
Source: https://www.loc.gov/collections/edison-company-motion-pictures-and-sound-recordings/articles-and-essays/biography/life-of-thomas-alva-edison/#:~:text=One%20of%20the%20most%20famous,improving%20the%20telegraph%20and%20telephone.

2. He created the world’s first industrial research laboratory. Before he died, in 1931, he had played a critical role in introducing the modern age of electricity. Edison invented many items, including the carbon transmitter, in response to specific demands for new products or improvements. In 1877, he achieved his most original discovery, the phonograph. Edison during the summer of 1877 was attempting to devise for it, as he had for the automatic telegraph, a machine that would transcribe signals as they were received, in this instance in the form of the human voice, so that they could then be delivered as telegraph messages. Edison devised a “microtasimeter” employing a carbon button. This was a time when great advances were being made in electric arc lighting, and during the expedition, which Edison accompanied, the men discussed the practicality of “subdividing” the intense arc lights so that electricity could be used for lighting in the same fashion as with small, individual gas “burners.”
Source: https://www.britannica.com/biography/Thomas-Edison

3. Thomas Edison was a prolific inventor who acquired a record number of 1,093 patents and was the driving force behind such innovations as the phonograph, the incandescent light bulb, the alkaline battery and one of the earliest motion picture cameras. He also created the world’s first industrial research laboratory. In addition to his talent for invention, Edison was also a successful manufacturer who was highly skilled at marketing his inventions—and himself—to the public. From 1870 to 1875, Edison worked out of Newark, New Jersey, where he developed telegraph-related products for both Western Union Telegraph Company (then the industry leader) and its rivals.
Source: https://www.history.com/topics/inventions/thomas-edison

4. Thomas Edison is the world gold standard for invention, innovation, and entrepreneurship. No one has ever duplicated the sheer volume and depth of his 1093 patents, virtually defining the standard of living we enjoy today. He invented both products and systems to support those products. His classic inventions were the phonograph, the electric light bulb, the electric power industry and motion pictures.​ Thomas Edison went on to systematize the process of invention, transforming it from a cottage industry into an industrial powerhouse that led to the modern day concept of R&D labs in most Fortune 500 companies.
Source: https://www.thomasedison.org/all-about-tom

5. Thomas Edison is responsible for the technologies that make modern life modern. By the time of his death in 1931, he held 1,093 patents covering the creation or refinements of devices in telegraphy and telephony, electric power generation and lighting, sound recording, motion pictures, storage batteries, and mining and cement technology. However, his most important invention was one that couldn’t be patented: the process of modern invention itself. By applying the principles of mass production to the 19th-century model of the solitary inventor, Edison created a process in which skilled scientists, machinists, designers, and others collaborated at a single facility to research, develop, and manufacture new technologies.
Source: https://www.menloparkmuseum.org/history

Other Sources:
https://invention.si.edu/thomas-edisons-inventive-life
https://www.fi.edu/history-resources/edisons-lightbulb
https://www.acs.org/content/acs/en/education/whatischemistry/landmarks/thomas-edison.html
https://www.nps.gov/edis/learn/historyculture/edison-biography.htm
https://com-gap.org/blog/how-thomas-edison-changed-communication